CHILDREN BURNT TO DEATH

When Newsday visited the rural community at Tattoo Trace off the Toco Road yesterday, residents wore dazed looks as they struggled to comprehend the loss of two innocent lives.

The victims’ three other siblings are now homeless and were staying at the homes of relatives.

Autopsies are expected to be done on the tiny, charred remains of the brother and sister at the Forensic Science Centre in St James for an official cause of death.

Villagers who spoke with Newsday did not mince words as to their thoughts on what caused the deaths of little Miracle and Mawaki - gross negligence. “Aye hear nah man, this is negligence of the worst order. How could you leave a four-year-old and two-year-old in a house unattended? All alone,” newly elected councillor for Valencia Simone Gill said. “I am not a mother, but as a woman, I do not understand how two children could be left home alone when there are avenues in which you could find a way to take care of your children. Poverty is not an excuse! “My grandmother grew up four children in a life of poverty and my other grandmother grew up 13 children and they always ensured that no matter what the safety of the children was first priority. They made sure that the children were safe. So I will not accept poverty as an excuse for what happened here,” the youthful councillor said. Gill was moved to tears while explaining the circumstances surrounding the fire.

It was reported that at about 12.40 pm yesterday, officers of the Valencia Police Post along with officers of the Trinidad and Tobago Fire Service responded to calls of a fire at Tattoo Trace but when they arrived the small, wooden house was already gutted and the whereabouts of the siblings could not be ascertained. When officers made preliminary checks, they found two charred corpses in the burnt out ruins of the house.

Police sources said that the two tiny bodies were found in an embrace at the entrance way to the structure leaving investigators to theorise that Miracle and Mawaki reached as far as the locked door before being overcome by the smoke. They lay next to each other and died in an embrace...a final act of sibling love in the face of impending fiery death. The district medical officer later ordered the bodies removed from the scene.

Newsday was told that neighbours smelled smoke but assumed that someone was burning garbage. It was not until they heard the screams of a woman that they realised something was wrong and called the authorities. Sources said when police interviewed two relatives of the dead children, they said that they had just left the house and when they looked back, they saw the house engulfed in flames. Newsday understands that when investigations are concluded, police may seek advice from the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP).

One relative is said to be a hair dresser while another is a taxi driver.

Judith Daniel, a villager, claimed this was not the first time that the children were left home alone. “This is not the first time. They accustomed leaving them children. At that age, they should have been in a daycare centre if those people could not stay with them. There is absolutely no reason except negligence for this tragedy to happen,” Daniel said.